US employers added 29,000 jobs in September as unemployment rose to 4.2 percent

US employers added 29,000 jobs in September and the unemployment rate rose to 4.2 percent, the Bureau of Labor Statistics said on Friday. The payroll gain missed a consensus clustered near 90,000, and it came with a 60,000 downward revision to the previous two months.

The household survey put the number of unemployed people at 7.1 million. Both the rate and the count changed little on the month, the bureau said, but the rate is a tenth of a point above the 4.1 percent figure markets had been using as the baseline into the release. The labour force participation rate stood at 61.8 percent.

On the establishment side, September's 29,000 gain followed an average monthly rise of 45,000 over the prior 12 months. Employment in every major industry changed little. The bureau still broke out a few moves inside that flat picture. Health care added 17,000 jobs, slower than its 33,000 average monthly gain over the previous year. Ambulatory health care services added 13,000 and hospitals added 12,000, while nursing and residential care facilities lost 9,000.

Construction added 11,000, with nonresidential specialty trade contractors accounting for 12,000 of that. Manufacturing added 9,000, including 5,000 in plastics and rubber products and 5,000 in machinery. Financial activities lost 7,000.

The revisions matter as much as the headline. July, first reported as a gain of 21,000, is now a loss of 10,000, a cut of 31,000. August was cut by 29,000, from 162,000 to 133,000. Together, July and August employment is 60,000 lower than the bureau had previously reported.

Pay cooled with hiring. Average hourly earnings for all employees on private nonfarm payrolls rose 5 cents, or 0.1 percent, to 37.81 dollars. Over the past 12 months those earnings are up 3.0 percent. Production and nonsupervisory employees saw a larger monthly move, up 7 cents, or 0.2 percent, to 32.60 dollars.

The print landed on a morning when traders were already braced for it. Reuters reported from Sydney before the release that Asian shares were lower, with MSCI's Asia-Pacific index outside Japan down 0.3 percent and on track for a weekly drop of 1.5 percent. Japan's Nikkei fell 1.1 percent on the day and was still up 2.8 percent for the week. Nasdaq futures were up 0.5 percent and S&P 500 futures 0.3 percent ahead of the number. Mainland Chinese markets were shut through the following Wednesday for a holiday.

The same pre-release note put the forecast centre at a gain of 90,000 jobs and an unemployment rate steady at 4.1 percent. Friday's figures missed both marks. Bloomberg, after the release, said the 29,000 gain missed every estimate in its survey of economists, and that the unemployment rate ticked up partly because the workforce grew.

The miss sits next to a separate price shock that the jobs report does not settle. Oil was already elevated into Friday on the US naval buildup in the Gulf. West Texas Intermediate was at 92.46 dollars a barrel in the Sydney session, after a near 3 percent rise overnight, and Brent was holding above 102 dollars. A soft payroll number pulls in one direction for interest-rate expectations. Dearer fuel pulls in the other. The September report does not say which force the Federal Reserve will treat as larger.

Inside the industry table, the health-care split is the clearest signal that the slowdown is not uniform. Hospitals and outpatient services are still adding staff. Nursing homes and residential care are not. Construction's gain was concentrated in nonresidential specialty trades, the contractors who fit out buildings rather than the firms that start them. Manufacturing's 9,000 was real on the month and still small against a sector that has spent much of the past two years near flat.

The two-month revision also changes the story of late summer. August's 162,000 had looked like a rebound. At 133,000 it is a smaller rebound. July is no longer a weak gain. It is a small loss. A reader who only saw the first August print would have thought the three-month pace was firmer than the bureau now says it was.

Nothing in the release points to a single industry collapse. The bureau's own line is that employment in all major industries changed little. The useful detail is the gap between that line and the 90,000 forecast, the 60,000 revision, and the 3.0 percent wage gain that is now running well below the pace of the previous tightening cycle.

The next test is whether October hiring stays near this 29,000 pace or returns toward the 45,000 average of the prior year. The September report, on its own, says employers added workers, just not at the rate the surveys had priced.